Education is a socially significant practice with its own history and it is also yet remains a highly topical issue of concern to individuals, communities and public authorities. Regardless of its practical dimensions, education is also an idea present in the reflections of teachers’ and educators’, but also writers’, philosophers’, publicists’ and politicians’ that acquires different meanings in various spatial and temporal contexts. Education is an object of academic investigations of both an empirical and theoretical nature. What distinguishes pedagogics from other disciplines is that it encompasses this socially meaningful space and treats it as its own domain. What is expected from pedagogics is expertise in the field of education which itself is treated by contemporary societies as both a public and individual good. How does the field find itself in this role? How does it understand and explore education? To what extent it is willing to be held responsible for this important element of public, social and private life?

Education is commonly associated with school, teaching and learning. Frequently, education becomes a politicized area subject to ideologization, technocratization and instrumentalization. It has been used for the realization or application of manifold goals established by different subjects (collective and individual, public and private). Is such an approach to education justified and how does pedagogics see this issue? To what degree does the field upholds such an understanding of education and to what degree does it extend beyond it?

The proposed topic of the conference invites us to ponder the meaning of education understood either widely, as an upbringing and instruction, or narrowly, as instruction. It is interesting to note that such perspectives on education, within which upbringing is reflected in instruction and vice versa, captures the relational character of the two processes as well as their mutual interconnections which remain crucial for pedagogics and its identity. From this viewpoint it is easier to ask questions about educational goods – those products of education that distinguish it from other undertakings. Namely, what distinguishes education from other social practices and when is it irreplaceable? What does it have at its disposal – what resources? Why do we value it? What does it equip us with and what does it allow for? What do we expect from it? In which way can it be helpful? These questions about educational goods extend beyond the practices of upbringing and instruction alone.

How does pedagogics as an academic discipline manages these goods? How does it explore them? How does it justify the uniqueness of educational goods for example via research and argumentation? Which goods are considered to be goals in themselves (autotelic) and which are understood to be means to achieve other goals (instrumental)? How does pedagogics explore, describe, explain, justify and identify as valuable the particular educational goods, e.g. humanity, development, moral character and personality, self-reliance, health, professional preparation, knowledge, wisdom, civility, socialization, entrepreneurship, citizenship...? How does it understand these goods from the dichotomous perspective of upbringing and instructing? How does it study these two aspects within various sub-disciplines and accordingly to what research strategies? To what extent is pedagogics influenced by ideas and practices developed over centuries in our civilization, including the legacy of Polish thought and educational practices?

Proposed thematic areas:

1. humanity, moral character and personality, self-reliance, health, professional preparation, knowledge, wisdom, civility, socialization, entrepreneurship, citizenship… – a review of educational goods and ways of justifying their pedagogical significance;
2. empirical and theoretical explorations of particular educational goods – studies of education in reference to the methods of the social sciences and humanities;
3. pseudos in education (lacks, reductions and falsehoods in education);
4. education and indoctrination;
5. subjects of the educational scene in view of the multitude of ideas and goods of education;
6. educational goods in the private, social and public spheres.

The aim of the conference is to present the results of studies in the field of education conducted both in Poland and abroad, to integrate the networks of academic pedagogues, (i.e. researchers and experts in the field of education), to deepen the identification of education as a subject of pedagogical studies as well as to reveal new research territories related to the problem of educational goods.

The conference will include plenary speeches, thematic presentations, and poster sessions. Papers can be delivered in Polish or English.

 

dr hab Katarzyna Wrońska
Chairman of the Conference Programme Council